A part of this view­ing list: Cri­te­rion Col­lec­tion Spine #164: Andrei Tarkovsky’s Solaris.

My Dos­to­evsky pro­fes­sor once said that Rus­sians are more Ori­en­tal than Occi­den­tal in tem­pera­ment, and the con­tem­pla­tive pac­ing and con­stant impor­tance of the unim­por­tant through­out Tarkovsky’s Solaris seems to sup­port this asser­tion fairly well. For those used to Stanis­law Lem’s whim­si­cal cyber­netic sci­ence fic­tion, Solaris is more rem­i­nis­cent of Philip K. Dick, espe­cially with its psy­cho­log­i­cal bent and hal­lu­cino­genic atmos­phere. These par­tic­u­lar aspects give the work and the film both sig­nif­i­cant stay­ing power; the fic­tion is phe­nom­e­no­log­i­cal instead of tech­no­log­i­cal. East­ern Euro­peans and Asi­at­ics always seem to pull off pen­sive mad­ness with much more believ­abil­ity than less thought­ful cul­tures. So Kris, Kelvin can stag­ger around Solaris Sta­tion in naught but his box­ers, eyes inward, but when he begins to talk about con­science and con­scious­ness and com­mu­ni­ca­tion, his out­ward dis­or­der is merely the sign of a com­plete inter­nal focus on more impor­tant problems.

Kelvin becomes a reflec­tion of Solaris Sta­tion, an utter ruin itself; both igno­rant to the means and effects of the Solaris Ocean which they are study­ing. Com­mu­ni­ca­tion seems to be the theme of this film. Com­mu­ni­ca­tion with the self as man­i­fested by the appear­ance of Hari, Kelvin’s long-​deceased wife, the planet’s attempt at com­mu­ni­ca­tion by proxy through the man­i­fes­ta­tion of Hari, tête-​a-​tête com­mu­ni­ca­tion between the sci­en­tists and the sci­en­tists attempts to com­mu­ni­cate with the planet via radi­a­tion. On a meta-​level we also have Tarkovsky’s attempt to com­mu­ni­cate the dif­fi­cul­ties of these processes to his view­ers. In the end it becomes eas­ier to toss the dice and hope that expla­na­tion through evo­ca­tion and imagery will suffice.

Kelvin seems admirably suited to his job as con­sul­tant for the con­tin­u­a­tion of the Solaris project. He is not so much objec­tive as com­pletely recep­tive and instead of sit­ting in indif­fer­ence, he explores in accep­tance. Because of this, he becomes, unwill­ingly, the first per­son to suc­cess­fully com­mu­ni­cate with the sen­tient ocean. After this occurs, the hal­lu­ci­na­tions cease, but the reap­pear­ance of Hari has exhumed his old skele­tons, and his is dis­qui­eted. At this point, Tarkovsky’s sub­tle mas­tery finally reveals itself, the small peace­ful nat­ural clues we’ve received through­out the film, flow­ing water, sway­ing plants, swirling vis­tas and obscu­rant clouds become visual rep­re­sen­ta­tions of Kelvin’s pri­vate thought processes, and the Solaris Ocean offers him full com­mu­nion with them. A form of com­mu­ni­ca­tion that we all only wish for.

• Cri­te­rion Essay by Philip Lopate.
• Andrei Tarkovsky on Solaris.
• Senses of Cin­ema arti­cle by the Strictly Film School guy.
• Movie Mar­tyr review with stills.
• Offi­cial site of Stanis­law Lem.
• Exhaus­tive site about the film and the book.
• Roger Ebert Review.
• YouTube Clips: 1, 2, 3, 4.